Federal, state officials target opioid addiction ‘epidemic’
Training needed for practitioners
Federal officials and representatives — including the head of the nation’s drug control policy office — joined local addiction recovery advocates and members of the public on Thursday to problem-solve the opioid addiction “epidemic.”
Rep. Michelle Luján Grisham, D-N.M., along with Damon Martinez, U.S. Attorney for the District of New Mexico, and Wayne Lindstrom, director of Behavioral Health Services Division for the state, launched the forum with presentations calling for federal help for the local problem.
About 120 community members attended the evening meeting at the University of New Mexico’s Domenici Center for Health Sciences Education.
They heard from Michael Botticelli, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, who said drug addiction is about as common as diabetes in the U.S.
“About 85 percent of people with diabetes get treatment. But only 12 percent” of people with addiction get treatment, he said.
And 13 of the state’s 33 counties have no medical practitioner authorized and trained to use opioid addiction treatment drugs.
Opioids, drugs that include heroin and prescription oxycodone, hydrocodone and fentanyl, are highly effective painkillers, but they also are highly addictive, linked to increased crime and a transition to heroin.
According to the National Institute of Drug Abuse, an estimated 2.1 million people in the United States suffered from addiction issues related to opioid pain relievers in 2012 and an estimated 467,000 were addicted to heroin.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that heroin-related overdoses nearly doubled between 2011 and 2013, but have started to drop. Still, President Barack Obama asked the Office of National Drug Control Policy to target
opioid addiction.
Rep. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M, has sponsored a bill to spend about $1 billion to fight heroin and opiate addiction. The money would be awarded to states with grant-ready proposals for such treatment centers and programs.
And the state needs more treatment.
Botticelli said free certification classes are being held for medical practitioners in the state to authorize them to use buprenorphine-type treatment drugs to help block the withdrawal symptoms. If more practitioners get that training, he said, more addicts can start transitioning to sobriety.